Understanding Torture and Torturing Environments

The first chapter of this book reviews the key elements of the definition of torture from legal, medical, ethical, and anthropological perspectives. Based on several examples, it examines how contemporary forms of coercion are increasingly moving away from the classical model of mistreatment or torture based on the production of physical pain or direct psychological suffering to methods of breaking the will of individuals and discusses the need to develop new theoretical models that will allow us to respond to this changing reality. The concept of torturing environments is proposed and defined as a new conceptual framework to address these challenges. The discussion is based on a theoretical conceptual model developed by the author in earlier work. The chapter compares torture as a legal concept and the torturing environment as a medical-psychological concept in search of its legal fit. The text then develops the elements that constitute a torturing environment, focusing particularly on its four core elements: attacks on physical survival; fear and attacks on the perception of security; defencelessness, uncertainty, and uncontrollability; and attacks on the possibility of control, as well as attacks on identity, dignity, and the self. Finally, the chapter analyses the application of the concept to collective, and the elements of coercion to be considered when organisations, groups, or communities are targeted.